Blown away by Zappo's customer servic

I've been wearing Merrell "Jungle Mocs" for many years. They're comfy for all day on one's feet, they are just dressy enough, and they're reasonably priced. They last a looooong time. I'll bet I've worn out a dozen pairs.

So when I found our three local Merrell dealers did not have my size in stock, I ordered from the online shoe store, Zappos, feeling comfortable about getting ones that fit. The shoes came - correct everything. - But the right shoe squeaked whenever I walked.

And when I say squeaked, it sounded like I was having major digestive issues, if you know what I mean. And while I love "pull my finger" gags as much as the next grandfather, this was a little embarrassing.

That said, I HATE returning any merchandise, especially online purchases. But after wearing the shoes a few times and hearing no reduction in the amount of tooting, I contacted Zappos about an exchange.

Here is their rather amazing response:

Hello Doug, 

Thank you for contacting the Zappos.com Customer Loyalty Team. My name is Ryan and I would be more than happy to help you today. 

I am sorry to hear that the Merrell Jungle Moc Leather that you purchased from us is a Squeaky McSqueakerson. That's definitely not something that we like to hear about our merchandise, and is not indicative of the high quality of service and products we strive to provide our customers. I am glad that you wrote us so we can immediately address this situation. 

We still have the same item available in color: Midnight Lether size: 11 width: Medium, and we would be more than happy to send a replacement out right away as an exchange. If you would be interested in this, please contact us via phone to get this processed for you, as we are unable to process exchanges over email contact. If you would prefer to order something else, we will need you to provide us with the SKU number, size, and color for the new item. 

For your convenience, Doug, I have emailed you a prepaid UPS return label. You will receive two emails regarding your return; one will be the return confirmation and the other will have a link that will take you to your return label once clicked. If you do not receive this e-mail, please check your spam folder because sometimes our emails are blocked by spam filters. Please keep in mind that the exchange request must be made prior to your return reaching our warehouse. 

Since you no longer have the original packaging that the item came in, please place the item in a plain plastic shopping bag and enclose it in a shipping box. Since our warehouse scans the original package to see who it belongs to, it would be helpful for you to print out your return confirmation email and include it inside the box. This will ensure that our warehouse can identify that you are the person sending this item back. 

I hope I was able to cover everything for you today. I apologize again for the inconvenience, Doug. We look forward to hearing from you soon, and if you have any other questions or concerns please do not hesitate to let us know. We are here 24/7, and can be reached by email, live chat or call. 

Your friendly Zapponian, 
Ryan O. 
Zappos Customer Loyalty Team 

Wow, NOT A FORM LETTER* - or at least totally. The new, squeak-free pair, were waiting for me at home the next day. Threw the old pair in the box the new one came in, slapped on the FedEx label, and off they went.

I hope Zappos is the new standard for customer service. I will buy more shoes from them. I will recommend them to my friends and not mention them to people I dislike. I hope Ryan gets a promotion. All good.

But what this exchange made me wonder about is what kind of experience people who call my office or put in a helpdesk ticket have when reporting a problem. Do they get a Zappos experience - or just zapped? What kind of response do I personally give people?

When companies like Zappos raise the bar on customer service, everyone in our school better be setting his or her sights a little higher as well. Parents will be expecting it.

* The only kind of creepy thing about this is the similarity of this enthusiastic response to those given by customer service reps in David Eggar's book The Circle. I wonder if Ryan O has a running customer satisfaction meter?

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In this afternoon's mail:

 

OK, I think we may be entering stalking territory here (or is it stocking?)